“In both its small details – paying off a mortgage after 25 hard years is a plot point – and its implied questions about the hollowness of some cherished American ideals, the play feels unusually, perhaps unhappily, timely.”

“It’s all too easy to assume that Stevens was some tortured artist forced into a life of Babbitt-y corporate drudgery. In fact, evidence suggests that he rather liked his peaceful routine in Hartford – his backyard garden, his wine cellar, even his job at the insurance company.”

“There are a number of professions in which workers are paid, in part, with a figurative lottery ticket. The worker accepts a lower-paying job in exchange for a slim but real chance of a large, future payday.”